Nicholas
II., Tsar of all Russia
on May 18, 1808, his father being
the late Tsar Alexander III., and his mother, the
NICHOLAS II., Tsar of all the Russia, was born at St.
PetersburgPrincess Dag- mar, a daughter of the King of
Denmark and a sister of the Princess of Wales. His
education was conducted on modern lines, at the express
wish of the late Tsar, and he was instructed in modern
languages and history, in constitutional history,
economics, and the law and administration of Russia. He
is a fluent linguist, and can speak French, German,
Italian and English, and is familiar with our literature
and manners. He has traveled in the East and visited India.
While in Japan a savage attack was made on his life by a
fanatical policeman, and on that occasion he displayed
personal courage of a high order. During the Russian
famine of 1891 he asked to be made President of the
Committee of Succor, and as such displayed great energy.
He succeeded his father Alexander III. on Nov. 1, 1894,
and on the 20th of the same month was married, in
accordance with the late Tsar's dying wish, to Princess
Alex of Hesse-Darmstadt, daughter of the late Princess
Alice. Previously to the Tsar's death this Princess had
been summoned to the sick man's bedside at Livadia, and
for some time it was supposed that the marriage would be
solemnized during his lifetime. In a manifesto, issued on
the occasion of his marriage, Nicholas II. said, "
Solicitous for the destinies of our new reign, we have
deemed it well not to delay the fulfillment of our
heart's wish, the legacy, so sacred to us, of our father,
now resting in God ; nor to defer the realization of the
joyful expectation of our whole people that our marriage,
hallowed by the benediction of our parents, should be
blessed by the Sacrament of our Holy Church." The
Imperial Manifesto proper announced the granting of
certain pecuniary alleviations to the classes connected
with agriculture, and contained the following notable
passage : — " We, in this sad but solemn hour,
when ascending the ancestral throne of the Russian Empire
and of the Tsardom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of
Finland, indissolubly connected with it, remember the
legacy left to us ?? our departed father, and inspired by
it, we, in the presence of the Most High, record the
solemn vow always to make our sole aim the peaceful
development of the pjwer and glory of our beloved Russia
and the happiness of all our faithful subjects." The
new Emperor has also recently proved himself favorable to
the principle of religious toleration, and of the
freedom, to a limited extent, of the press, so far as it
concerns the censorship of foreign newspapers imported
into Russia. Before he came to the throne, Tsar Nicholas
II. held several military commands, and was Colonel of
the Preobrajensky Regiment. In 1893 the Order of the
Garter was conferred upon him. His heir is at present his
brother, the Grand Duke George, who was born in 1871. He
is wintering in the Caucasus, and is dangerously ill. His
title, until the birth of an heir in the direct line,
will be Tzarewitch and Crown Prince.
Men and Women of the Time: A Dictionary of
Contemporaries By Victor Plarr
Published by G. Routledge and Sons, limited, 1895 Page
626
|